Louis van Gaal has confirmed that Manchester United will be without star goalkeeper David de Gea for the Europa League clash against FC Midtjylland.
The Red Devils suffered a 2-1 defeat at the hands of the Danish champions in the first leg away from home. Before the clash, when the players were warming up, the former Atletico Madrid star picked up an injury, which forced Van Gaal to make a late change to his starting lineup and replace De Gea by Sergio Romero.
The Argentine international, who was also in between the posts against United's 3-0 victory over Shrewsbury Town will be starting against Midtjylland. Van Gaal earlier was hoping that De Gea could be fit for the midweek European fixture, but admitted the Spaniard will miss the clash on Thursday.
"I was hoping for that but he shall not be involved, that is already certain," Van Gaal told United's official website.
Antonio Valencia and Marcos Rojo did not feature for United since last October and November respectively. The duo, who were sidelined with long-term injuries have now returned to training.
The former Barcelona and Bayern Munich manager confirmed that Rojo will be on the bench against Midtjylland, but Valencia still needs time to recover.
"Valencia didn't train with our first squad, only individually as part of his own programme. Rojo has only trained with the second team yesterday and today with the first squad so he's on the bench but is only good for 20 minutes or something like that," United manager told MUTV.
The current list of injured players include Luke Shaw, Phil Jones, Cameron Borthwick-Jackson, Ashley Young, Marouane Fellaini, Bastian Schweinsteiger and Will Keane. Adnan Januzaj has already featured in the Europa League with Borussia Dortmund, which means the Belgium international is cup tied for Thursday fixture.
